


SEVEN

by Chocolatos



Series: Minho and Gwiboon [1]
Category: SHINee, Super Junior, 소녀시대 | Girls' Generation | SNSD
Genre: F/M, Originally Posted on LiveJournal, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-29
Updated: 2020-08-29
Packaged: 2021-03-07 00:54:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,970
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26178316
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Chocolatos/pseuds/Chocolatos
Summary: Kim Gwiboon first met Choi Minho when she was seven. It was just the beginning.
Relationships: Choi Minho/Kim Gwiboon, Choi Siwon/Choi Sooyoung, Jung Sooyeon | Jessica/Kim Jonghyun (SHINee)
Series: Minho and Gwiboon [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1901074
Kudos: 1





	SEVEN

Choi Minho is only seven, but he is wise enough to know if someone is decent to be befriended with or not.

“Why are you looking at me?” Gwiboon sneers, “am I that pretty? Mommy said it’s not polite to stare at someone you’re not close with.”

That alone is enough of a reason not to like someone as devious as Kim Gwiboon.

“... beside Choi Minho, we’ve just met.”

Can someone be this annoying on the said first time meeting?

Minho averts his eyes from a certain point behind Kim Gwiboon’s head to land on that girl’s eyes. “I’m not looking at you.”

He tries, _underlines that_ ; he tries to keep his voice down low because, seriously, he’s in the sulky mode for being dragged here, to the middle of nowhere, just because his parents suddenly felt like visiting their old friends. Also, because of his mother’s excessive paranoia of a babysitter, they dragged their child along to this trip even though Minho was and is still sure that his parents just want to brag about their son to this Kim family.

Not that Minho doesn’t have something to brag about, because he’s such a smart and adorable boy. The Kim family, to be honest, Uncle Jonghyun and his wife, Aunt Jessica are nice, but Minho can’t say the same to their daughter, Gwiboon. That pinky princess-like girl is noisy. For Choi Minho, being trapped in a room with too much pink stuff, to the extent there’s no room for other colors to fit in, is a kind of the scariest nightmare a seven-year-old boy could ever have. He’s supposed to be in his cozy and obviously manlier room, playing with Jinki, Taemin, Changmin, and Kyuhyun.

Definitely not with a live version of a baby doll clad in a pink tutu, pink ballet shirt, pink stockings, pink ballet shoes, and thank God, her hair isn’t pink, but black and gathered in a long loose ponytail and… and pretty. She’s hugging a huge pink stuffed bear and looking at him like he is a frog prince or something.

Please, Minho is sure he’s not that weird.

Gwiboon singsongs, “liar, liar, your nose will get bigger.”

Minho’s brows arched hearing this lame made-up song Gwiboon has just sung. Being hasty is one thing, but being told that he’s a liar is another thing. “Your nose is already bigger than mine, don’t you know that?”

“Yah!”

Minho jumps off of his seat because Gwiboon suddenly stands right under his nose, with both of her hands on the waist. She looks at him with her two narrowed eyes.

“Oh, step back!” He unconsciously makes a gesture to shoo her away out of shock, by waving his hand, and she looks even more offended. Seriously, jumping in front of other people out of the blue is not nice either.

“You are so rude!” she stomps, sticks out her tongue, and runs to the door. “I’m going to tell Mommy,” then leaves the room.

_BANG._

She slams the door.

“Oh, look who’s talking.”

Minho shrugs, feeling no burden at all as he lays himself down onto the fluffy bed. He stares at the ceiling, sighing, and feeling like he’s twenty-seven instead of seven. Gwiboon is a clown for him ever since he and his family arrived in Daegu this evening. She acts all high and mighty, making Minho believes a princess ghost possesses Gwiboon, seeing how spoiled and mischievous she behaves. Minho grins because she’s funny. Even though for him she’s a little weird, her response when being teased is kind of amusing.

“Weird.” Minho’s eyes wander around the room. He frowns here and there whenever his eyes catch something funny. His hands flail up and he thoughtlessly drops his hands down back onto the bed before he suddenly jumps out of it, as if the bed is a fire. Something soft… something too soft has touched his fingertips, and he feels goosebumps all over his body.

“Why all the things here are pink?” The thick pink duvet can’t answer his question. “Why am I even here?”

He glances around.

“Oh, she likes childish things I could die,” Minho whines but steps closer to the other side of the room, to Gwiboon’s Polaroid pictures covered wall.

“Choi Minho”

Maybe the boy is just too engrossed with examining Gwiboon’s photos on the wall, for him to notice the door opens. Minho turns around and sees his mother, Choi Sooyoung, a tall woman with tanned skin and shoulder-length hair, crossing her arms in front of him. His mother raises one of her brows in a way she always does when her lovely son does wrong, but Minho ignores it. He smiles oh so casually,

“Hi Mom, are we going back home now?”

“I’m afraid we can’t baby,” his mother replies but smiling this time. “Anyway, I’m wondering,” tells her when she shifts towards him and kneels to eye level with him. “Do you know why Gwiboon is crying? She said something about you being rude.”

Minho’s already ruined mood falls even more. “Mom, I did nothing,” he whines and pouts. “I swear she’s sneaky, she could make up the story.”

“Really?” Sooyoung tucks his curly-haired behind the ear, patting the boy’s head. “Listen, I want you to behave, you two are the same age and I think she’s a sweetheart—“

Minho pulls a face sound hearing this. “Seriously?”

“Yes, she is, and I want you to get along with her because we’re going to stay here until tomorrow.”

“Moooom…”

“I don’t want to hear you scolding or talking rudely at her again.”

“I did not scold her, I told you.”

“Yes Honey, I trust you. I just tell you not to, okay.” Sooyoung nods her head to emphasize her point when Minho tries to make another protest attempt. “Your father and uncle Jonghyun have things to do, so do I and Aunt Jessica, so be my wonderful son like always, will you?”

“What?”

Sooyoung smiles sweetly, “either that or no football for a month?”

Minho’s mouth agape, he’s sulky again. “Did Gwiboon teach you that, Mom?”

Sooyoung shrugs, standing up and ushering him to go out of the room while Minho rolls his eyes, halfheartedly leaving the pink castle. In a short time, he has learned that this horrible bedroom is maybe much more delightful than seeing Gwiboon.

When he reaches the foot of stairs, there’s a lively performance of Gwiboon singing _You Are My Sunshine_ with her parents and Minho's father as the audience. They are swaying their hands up in the air as if she is a top star or such. Minho is about to laugh when a squeak coming right behind him.

“Aw, look at that, isn’t she lovely?”

_Who?_

Minho’s head whipped to his mother, and he cringes because his mother looks like she’s ready to flail around. There’s something wrong with the adults’ brains, Minho decides because he doesn’t find that the high-pitched voice of Gwiboon’s, is decent enough for his ears. He already loses count of rolling his eyes, even more, when his and Gwiboon’s parents clap their hands cheerfully after that poor performance.

“Minho?”

His father, a tall handsome man with thick eyebrows, big round eyes, sharp nose, two dimples on each cheek and fat lips by the name of Choi Siwon, waves at him, beckoning him to come closer and Minho grins. If there’s one person in this world who definitely won’t lose his mind easily because of Gwiboon’s fake cuteness, it must be his father.

“Gwiboon’s is a talented singer, isn’t she?”

“Wow,” Minho grins, showing a row of his white teeth. “I forgot you clapped the loudest, Dad.”

Siwon frowns, “excuse me, young man?”

“Nothing,” Minho moves toward his parents, maintaining the smile on his face. “She’s… mn, cute, isn’t she?”

That’s what they want to hear, right? Minho tries not to roll his eyes again, seeing his mother nods in excitement and giggles together with Aunt Jessica. He shudders and turns around to face Gwiboon. That pink doll is smiling… and… and, as Minho shakes his head, he will not lose.

No.

That’s why he puts on an uncommon expression than one he put in front of the elder once his eyes meet Gwiboon. None of the adults notices a glare and little smirk on Minho’s face that make Gwiboon frowns. She looks taken aback when Minho mouths a mute, “what?” with a harsh expression. Kim Gwiboon gulps in horror.

“D-daddy…” averting her eyes from Minho, she finds her father in a search of comfort.

“Yes, Gwiboonie?” Uncle Jonghyun answers his daughter in a sweet voice.

Gwiboon peeks at Minho once again. By the look on her face, Minho knows she regrets that because his expression doesn’t soften and is even more threatening.

Gwiboon stutters, “I-I think I’m going to eat brownie in the kitchen."

“Oh okay, you can take Minho with you too,” her mother speaks this time. Gwiboon wide-eyed. But before she can even spell one word, Minho has already done it for her. He turns around and acts like a good boy, smiling politely.

“Thank you, Aunt Jessica,” and he turns back to Gwiboon again. “Shall we?”

Minho smiles triumphantly when Gwiboon freezes on her spot and does a quick nod before making her way to the kitchen. She’s almost running.

However, Minho is back into his rolling eyes parade when hearing his mother says, “look at those two, getting closer in a no time. Who knows, we could be in-laws.”

God, they’re only seven.

“Just watching you tire me out,” Minho has his head propped on his palm, while Gwiboon is trying hard to open the lid of the jam jar. He yawns; looking at his watch, fifteen minutes have passed. “Want me to help you?”

“No.”

“Okay.”

Minho is a nice kid, he means it when he offers his help. However, he doesn’t do twice. So when finally another five minutes passes and Gwiboon huffs, wiping her sweaty forehead with the back of her hand and looks at him with those hopeless eyes, strangely, he finds that action is cute enough.

“Choi Minho, can you help me?”

“That’s what I was trying to do.”

“Please?” Gwiboon pushes the bottle of jam towards Minho shyly. “Mommy said it’s not nice to refuse.”

_Excuse me?_

Minho chokes, ready to die of laughing, but accepts that. He glances at Gwiboon once as he calmly twists the lid, thinking, who’s in the right mind eating a brownie with peanut butter and strawberry jam, anyway?

“Here,” Minho pushes the bottle back to Gwiboon, who tries hard not to squeak and watches him in amusement. As if that’s the best thing she has ever seen in her seven years of life.

“Thank you,” she accepts that happily and hops down to the floor, grabbing a plastic knife from the kitchen drawer to slice the long-awaited brownie. Finally, Minho thinks, even though the way she holds that knife is awkward and not very convincing.

“Ngh…” Gwiboon looks up from her place and stares at him expectantly; She aims the plastic knife towards him. “Do you know how to slice this?”

Minho facepalms. God, can this girl do something useful for once?

“You’re hopeless,” he shakes his head and reaches out to take the knife from her. Minho doesn’t notice the way Gwiboon's lips curl into a definitely not so innocent smirk.

“You’re not drinking it.”

“Huh?”

“That,” Gwiboon nudges the plastic cup with her finger. They’re in the middle of playing tea party. Thanks to Gwiboon’s constant pestering. “You don’t drink the tea I made for you.”

“Oh this,” Minho shrugs. Gwiboon is calm when asking him that, actually. “I’m bored.”

“You want me to make you another _acappatea?_ ”

“Sorry?”

Gwiboon sighs, looking at him as if Minho is illiterate. “Do I have to repeat everything I’ve just said?”

Minho blinks. “Whatever.”

Gwiboon pouts, and Minho grins, feeling the overwhelming joy for winning over this girl once again.

“Whateveeer— “ Minho singsongs and they sit in silence for another five minutes in peace, without Gwiboon’s reckless whining.

The two kids watch their parents chitchatting while busying themselves with grilling the meat for their little barbecue party. Minho thanks God for making Gwiboon change her clothes into something less fancy. Even though the shirt she wears is still pink, at least she wears a jeans mini skirt. Minho is just about to enjoy the silence before Gwiboon suddenly feels like she is in the need to bother him again.

“Let’s hide in my treehouse.”

“Hide? Why do we have to hide?”

Gwiboon acts like she already knows his reaction and just flicks her hair, saying, “ _duh_ , so our parents will remember that they have children. They already forgot about us. Also, I don’t want Mommy trapping me to sit with you anymore.”

In which Minho immediately snorts, “as if I do this willingly.”

Of course, Gwiboon just has to ignore that. “Oh, are you scared?”

Choi Minho, who hates losing, feels his pride being stepped on. He challenges, “but you can’t use stairs to get up.”

“You’re stupid, how can I get up there if I don’t use the ladder?”

Minho smiles triumphantly, and Gwiboon rolls her eyes before realization comes to her.

“No, we won’t,” she says, eyes dilated with fear.

“Is our princess scared now?” Minho mocks, grinning from ear to ear. It makes Gwiboon bites her lips and contemplates to go with the dare or not. But seeing Minho wins the brief battle hurts her pride.

“Be my slave if I can climb up, no bargain.”

Minho continues smiling. He is so sure she will not make it. “And vice versa.”

“Deal.”

“Should we spit on each other now?” Minho stops her for a second. Gwiboon looks at him in disgust when he spits on his hand. “Natives I saw on Natural Geographic channel do that to seal the deal.”

That day, Gwiboon learns that Choi Minho deserves to be on top of ’10 things Kim Gwiboon hates the most’ list. “You’re gross.”

Being called gross doesn’t stop Minho from winning their little bet as he watches how Gwiboon conscientiously and as carefully as she could climb up the tree. The sweat dripped from her forehead as she looks down at him and suddenly shudders. The clarity of fear is all Minho can see from her face and he hums, tapping his feet.

“Haha, do you still not give up?”

“No way!” Gwiboon looks away gracefully and tries to move her feet from one place to another, but a muffled scream shut her up when her foot slips a little. Both of her hands grasp the small branch as she hangs there hopelessly. “Ch-Choi Minho,” she calls out, but the boy has already rushed to stand under her while she tightens her grip. “I’m scared.”

It also scares the boy below to death, “do you want to go down?”

It’s not that high, he still can catch her if she wants to jump down.

“H-How?” Gwiboon tries to peek down at him but immediately closes her eyes again, seeing her feet swaying back and forth in the air. “Help me, Choi Minho.”

…

“Choi Minho?” She looks down again to a startled and flustered Minho below her. His cheeks redden and he seems to glue on the same spot with his eyes, looks up to a certain spot. He has seen something he shouldn’t see and his mouth forms an _‘O’_ shape.

“Wow.”

“YAH!” A heat creeps onto Gwiboon’s face as she realizes that, and she yells at him, forgetting that she’s hanging up in the air. “Don’t peep—MOMMYYYYY?”

A loud scream from Gwiboon has startled the adults as they rush to the other side of the garden. Jessica turns pale thinking something has happened to her precious daughter. Though the scene presented before their eyes is… rather unexpected because Gwiboon is lying on top of Minho and their lips pressed against each other. It seems like the children are still out of the trance because their eyes still tightly shut. Gwiboon’s hand clutched onto Minho’s front shirt.

Jessica blinks, “Boonie?”

Followed by a hesitant but amused Sooyoung, “Minho?”

As if on cue, the pair opens their eyes and once they do, Gwiboon screams again and jumps off of him, spitting out the germs and standing feet away from the boy. Minho is just the same if it’s not worse.

He stands as calmly as he could with disgust expression befell from his face, wiping his lips with his sleeve. “What?”

Gwiboon doesn’t answer but the end of her lips quivered and the seven-year-old girl looks at her mother before suddenly running back towards the house, leaving not only Minho but also their parents stunned.

“I’m sorry, okay.” Minho quietly retorts after sometimes, feeling all the adults’ gaze on him and can’t stand being blamed for something he didn’t intend to happen. The boy refuses to talk to his mother and makes his attempt to leave the scene as well; heading up to the wooden gazebo in the front part of the house and leaving the parents to exchange their gazes.

“I’ll talk to her,” Jonghyun offers, stopping his wife from doing so, and Jessica nods. Jonghyun has always been better at this matter than her.

“I’ll get him too,” Siwon tells his wife. As much as Sooyoung wants to protest, she knows her boy needs time alone with his father.

Jessica links her arm with Sooyoung, nudging Minho’s mother to where they had left. “We’ll just continue making dinner then.”

They watch their husbands go in respective directions.

“It should worry me, shouldn’t it?”

“I don’t know,” answers Jessica. She then sees Sooyoung has crossed her arm and looks at her with deep thought. She carefully adds, “but I kinda like Minho.”

“Isn’t this too fast?”

“I didn’t say I want him to be my son-in-law though, I just said I like him.”

“But, that was cute, don’t you think?” Sooyoung thinks out loud and Jessica lets out a light chuckle.

“Yes. Did you see Gwiboon’s face?”

Sooyoung nods, “I think I like her too.”

Jonghyun finds Gwiboon curling up into a ball on her bed. “Hi, Gwiboon?”

“I don’t want to talk.”

Jonghyun closes the door and climbs up into her bed, softly tapping her head. It’s not so hard to distinguish because her loose ponytail is peeking under the cover. “I didn’t ask you to talk.”

“Don’t you know the liar gets his nose bigger, Daddy?” Gwiboon pulls down her blanket a little just above her nose.

“Did Mommy tell you that?”

“No. It was Pinocchio.” Jonghyun puts a serious face. But Gwiboon doesn’t buy it. She slaps his arm, softly. Jonghyun fakes a whine and lies down beside her. “Well—“

“He’s stupid isn’t he?”

“Who?”

“Choi Minho,” Gwiboon pulls her cover up again, hiding herself from the rest of the world and Jonghyun chuckles. He is playfully pulling the cover off of her, earning himself an annoyed growl from the daughter.

“Why is he stupid?”

Gwiboon glares at her father and sits up quickly, pulling her cover back to hide. “Because he stole my first kiss now, I couldn’t get to meet my prince anymore. He stole it, he stole it.”

Jonghyun’s mind plays the scene in their garden. As much as he wants to believe her, it wasn’t Minho lying on top of her; it was Gwiboon. He scratches the back of his neck and takes a deep breath. He has to be careful and smart. Explaining this matter to Gwiboon at such a young age isn’t an effortless task. “Do you want me to tell you how I met your mother?”

“Did you kiss her under the tree too?”

“Sort of.”

“It’s not my fault.”

Siwon taps his son’s head lightly. “Did I say it was your fault?”

“She’s such a nuisance.” Minho is back on his sulky mode. “She kept pestering me and she fell onto me.”

Siwon hums, “what were you two doing there, anyway?”

Minho shrugs. “She wanted us to get into her treehouse and I dared her to climb up without the ladder.”

“Choi Minho.” Siwon frowns a little, “did you ask her to do that? Why?”

“I don’t know,” Minho grins. “I just like it. See her face when I told her to climb. She was funny and—“

“And?”

Minho huffs, “end of discussion. Can we not talk about this, Dad?”

“Cool.”

The weather is pleasant and the father and son have drowned into their own world, seeing the pool of stars above them. Siwon knows Minho is occasionally stealing a glance at him, but he acts like he doesn’t know because Minho will come to him once he feels okay with himself.

“Dad, when did you have your first kiss?”

“Hmm?” Siwon’s brows knitted together and he hums while thinking. “I’m not sure, maybe when I was in the second year of junior school.”

“Okay,” the son has his eyes back to the stars. “How was it?”

Siwon tilts his head to glimpse his son without making Minho feels awkward about the whole situation, he’s still so young. “It felt funny.”

“How funny?”

“Like, there was something in my chest, heart thumping.”

“Okay,” Minho taps his finger to his stomach. “My stomach feels funny, it tickles, tingly.”

Siwon tries not to laugh because this conversation gets funny and funnier as time keeps ticking. “Really?”

“Yeah,” now Minho keeps his head down, alternating between being shy and satisfied. “Maybe everyone gets different reactions?”

Siwon laughs, ruffling his son’s head. “Sort of.”

Even though Jonghyun and Siwon can get both Gwiboon and Minho back to the yard, but the two refuse to sit within arm's reach. Both of them respectively sit on each end of the table, which ends up with them stealing glances occasionally to each other, every time they think one is not looking. Jessica has to send her death glare to Jonghyun, who tries hard not to laugh because of these kids’ demeanor. Siwon acts more civilized, even though it has something to do with constant kicks under the table from Sooyoung.

“I’m done,” Gwiboon announces quietly and pushes her plate away. “Mommy, can I go upstairs?”

“Don’t forget to brush your teeth, sweetheart, and no tv, it’s already past your bedtime.”

Like a princess, Gwiboon stands up and walks to her parents, giving them each two kisses on the cheeks and politely bits her goodbye. Choi Minho might be only seven, but he knows how to determine whether someone is pretentious. He wipes his mouth with a clean napkin and fakes his yawn.

“Thank you for the meal, Aunt Jessica.”

Gwiboon is tiptoeing in the kitchen, washing something in the sink, when Minho gets back into the house. She has changed into her pajamas and surprised upon finding Minho stands in the kitchen. She has a glass of milk in her hand.

“Do you want it too?”

Minho sees her shifting her weight from one foot to another. She looks groggy.

“Sure. Thank you.”

Choi Minho and Kim Gwiboon sit on the couch; side by side fifteen minutes later. There are half-empty glasses of milk on the table and a large bowl of popcorn on Minho’s lap, Tom and Jerry played on the video. Gwiboon knows her mother will tell them not to if she sees that, but it doesn’t matter because right now Minho is laughing for something that Jerry did. She looks at him, smiling. The misunderstanding has already long forgotten.

“You’re laughing.”

“Hmm?” Minho tilts his head and chews on his popcorn. “So?”

“You’re laughing,” repeats her.

Minho shrugs, feeding her with a handful of popcorn and she whines, slapping him on the head. But they’re laughing. Well, they’re only seven.


End file.
